6 ms·

How far off are we from 8K gaming?

by icpmacdo 10y ago

gigatexal 10y ago
Still far away. I'd say 2 cycles more at least.
- ekianjo 10y ago
  And we need 8k basically to do VR at proper resolution, too, on each eye.
  - zeusk 10y ago
    No, we don't. Latest GPU architectures including Vega (and Pascal obv) support rendering the scene once and then projecting it from two viewports thereby generating two scenes without having to render the entire scene twice. Here is an article on Nvidia's implementation: http://www.anandtech.com/show/10325/the-nvidia-geforce-gtx-1080-and-1070-founders-edition-review/11 http://www.anandtech.com/show/10325/the-nvidia-geforce-gtx-1...
    - modeless 10y ago
      The pixel shaders still have to run twice, and especially at 8k the pixel shaders will be the vast majority of the work.
      - alkonaut 10y ago
        Surely some of the work should be possible to re-use? I mean for most pixels beyond a certain depth the incident eye vector direction will be identical for all practical purposes, so if one could just fudge it and use the same calculated pixel color for both eyes and just offset it slightly then it should be usable without having to be calculated twice. No one would notice if the reflections or specular lobe for the right eye were calculated with the indicent camera of the left eye. Once you have calculated the pixels for the left eye, those should be possible to re-use for the right eye, with some mapping. Certain pixels that are only visible to the right eye will have to be computed. I'm not sure if it's possible or if it even has a chance to be a performance gain (or indeed if this is actually how it already works). Doing the full job of 2x4k pixels for two eyes when they are a) almost identical for objects beyond a certain distance and b) quality is almost irrelevant for most pixels where the user isn't looking. With foveal rendering and some shortcuts it should be possible to go faster with a 2x4k VR setup than for a regular 4k screen when you need to render every pixel perfectly because you don't know what's important/where the user is looking. Obviously one needs working eye tracking etc. first too...
        ClassyJacket 10y ago
        I agree with you. There's no reason to run every pixel shader twice in full. It seems logical that each surface/polygon could be rendered once, for the eye that can see the most of it (a left facing surface for the left eye, a right facing surface for the right eye), then squashed to fit the correct view for the other eye. Then, fill in all the blanks. Of course, the real algorithm would be more complicated than this, but it seems like at least some rendering could be saved this way. Technically the lighting won't be right, but you don't have to use it for every polygon, and real-time 3D rendering is already all about making it 'good enough' to trick the human visual system, not to be mathematically accurate. If technically-accurate was what we insisted on, games would be 100x100 pixels at 15FPS as we'd insist on using photon mapping.
        jsheard 10y ago
        What you're describing is already a thing, UE4 just shipped an experimental implementation in 4.15. Search for Monoscopic Far Field Rendering here: https://www.unrealengine.com/blog/unreal-engine-4-15-released https://www.unrealengine.com/blog/unreal-engine-4-15-release...
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  - RyanZAG 10y ago
    2 screens of 4k is not 8k though.
    - ekianjo 10y ago
      Yeah, it's not, but that's close enough - if you have a 8K capable GPU, then you should be able to run 4K on two eyes at very high frame rates.
  - OGloMe 10y ago
    we actually will need less gpu power for vr than for monitor gaming. foveated rendering will do the trick
    - russdill 10y ago
      Will be an exciting time once super high pixel count displays and eye tracking combine. What a time to be alive.
  - shpx 10y ago
    60 pixels per degree, 210° by 100° for full 20/20 vision (most people have slightly better)[0]. Headsets right now are ~12 pixels per degree. Thats a 12600x6000 screen = 76megapixels. 4k is 8.3 megapixels, 8k is 33.2 megapixels. 8k/eye sounds about right. [0] https://youtu.be/Qwh1LBzz3AU?t=23m39s https://youtu.be/Qwh1LBzz3AU?t=23m39s
  - snovv_crash 10y ago
    If we do eye tracking we can probably lower that to 1024x786 equivalent rendering, by using high resolution where the eye is looking and tapering off to just a blurry mess further away. You can even completely leave out the pixels at the optic nerve blind spot. The person with the headset won't be able to tell they aren't getting full 4k or even higher resolution. And we can run better effects, more anti-aliasing, maybe even raytracing in real-time.
    - angry_octet 10y ago
      If this is the nvidia/smi research you are referring too, well it seems nice but without details, specifically dynamic performance, and there is reason to be sceptical of how good it is. The field of view of current consumer HMDs is too narrow for there to be a big saving compared to the downside. As you move to larger FOV displays the brain will start doing more saccades (rapid step changes in viewpoint[1]) and the response time of the image generator and eye tracker is too slow to generate more pixels at the right spot. It's much more effective to just render the whole thing at the maximum possible resolution. There has been promising research on rendering at a reduced update rate or reduced geometry in low interest areas of the scene[2]. Also, eye tracking is a massive pain in the ass. [1]https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/books/NBK10991/ https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/books/NBK10991/ [2]https://kth.diva-portal.org/smash/get/diva2:947325/FULLTEXT01.pdf https://kth.diva-portal.org/smash/get/diva2:947325/FULLTEXT0...
Orangeair 10y ago
Quite far away. Even the Titan X Pascal is having some trouble maintaining a consistent 60 fps in all games. http://www.gamersnexus.net/hwreviews/2659-nvidia-gtx-titan-x-pascal-review-and-benchmark/page-4 http://www.gamersnexus.net/hwreviews/2659-nvidia-gtx-titan-x... See the Mirror's Edge and The Division benchmarks. Averages are (just) over 60, but there are dips below. Personally, I think the best resolution for current-gen cards is 3440x1440. Should be rock solid 60+ fps in all games, and gives the benefit of being ultrawide.
- yoodenvranx 10y ago
  I haven't owned a gaming PC in close to 10 years and todays performance numbers look completely crazy to me. The last time I played a game I was happy that I could get 1024x768 smoothly with high framerates. Seeing that you can play 3440x1440 with 60fps feels like magic.
  - Warp__ 10y ago
    It's Amazing. Battlefield 1 on Ultra/Headphones/3440x1440 at 60fps is Incredibly Immersive.
    - Foxhuls 10y ago
      Have you gotten to see the ultrawides that run at 100hz? They're pretty incredible.
      - braveo 10y ago
        Do you have a link to one of these?
        bcrescimanno 10y ago
        There are two and they use the same panel: * ASUS PG348Q (I own this one and I love it) * Acer Predator X34 (My colleague 4 seats down has this one and she loves it).
kayoone 10y ago
this card can do 4K pretty comfortably now, at least if 60fps is the benchmark (VR needs more) but 8K is still pretty far away. Other than VR, there is hardly a use case for it though, and even in 4K VR should be a lot better than it is now.
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mtgx 10y ago
Check the framerates games get on 4k resolution, divide by 4, and then see how far away you are from at least 30fps.
godzillabrennus 10y ago
Linus Tech Tips on YouTube recently got an 8K setup going using four 4K monitors and it ran surprisingly well. https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=211Vdi4oC9o https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=211Vdi4oC9o The biggest limitation it seems is lack of displays because the gpu tech seems to be able to handle it.
replete 10y ago
8K anything is almost pointless unless you have far above average eyesight, like 20:5. 4K is the real sweet spot for typical human vision.
- rocky1138 10y ago
  Perhaps for a desktop or laptop, but in VR it will make a tremendous difference. 4320p will be really nice for VR.

How far off are we from 8K gaming?

gigatexal 10y ago

Still far away. I'd say 2 cycles more at least.

ekianjo 10y ago
And we need 8k basically to do VR at proper resolution, too, on each eye.
- zeusk 10y ago
  No, we don't. Latest GPU architectures including Vega (and Pascal obv) support rendering the scene once and then projecting it from two viewports thereby generating two scenes without having to render the entire scene twice. Here is an article on Nvidia's implementation: http://www.anandtech.com/show/10325/the-nvidia-geforce-gtx-1080-and-1070-founders-edition-review/11 http://www.anandtech.com/show/10325/the-nvidia-geforce-gtx-1...
  - modeless 10y ago
    The pixel shaders still have to run twice, and especially at 8k the pixel shaders will be the vast majority of the work.
    - alkonaut 10y ago
      Surely some of the work should be possible to re-use? I mean for most pixels beyond a certain depth the incident eye vector direction will be identical for all practical purposes, so if one could just fudge it and use the same calculated pixel color for both eyes and just offset it slightly then it should be usable without having to be calculated twice. No one would notice if the reflections or specular lobe for the right eye were calculated with the indicent camera of the left eye. Once you have calculated the pixels for the left eye, those should be possible to re-use for the right eye, with some mapping. Certain pixels that are only visible to the right eye will have to be computed. I'm not sure if it's possible or if it even has a chance to be a performance gain (or indeed if this is actually how it already works). Doing the full job of 2x4k pixels for two eyes when they are a) almost identical for objects beyond a certain distance and b) quality is almost irrelevant for most pixels where the user isn't looking. With foveal rendering and some shortcuts it should be possible to go faster with a 2x4k VR setup than for a regular 4k screen when you need to render every pixel perfectly because you don't know what's important/where the user is looking. Obviously one needs working eye tracking etc. first too...
      - ClassyJacket 10y ago
        I agree with you. There's no reason to run every pixel shader twice in full. It seems logical that each surface/polygon could be rendered once, for the eye that can see the most of it (a left facing surface for the left eye, a right facing surface for the right eye), then squashed to fit the correct view for the other eye. Then, fill in all the blanks. Of course, the real algorithm would be more complicated than this, but it seems like at least some rendering could be saved this way. Technically the lighting won't be right, but you don't have to use it for every polygon, and real-time 3D rendering is already all about making it 'good enough' to trick the human visual system, not to be mathematically accurate. If technically-accurate was what we insisted on, games would be 100x100 pixels at 15FPS as we'd insist on using photon mapping.
      - jsheard 10y ago
        What you're describing is already a thing, UE4 just shipped an experimental implementation in 4.15. Search for Monoscopic Far Field Rendering here: https://www.unrealengine.com/blog/unreal-engine-4-15-released https://www.unrealengine.com/blog/unreal-engine-4-15-release...
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- RyanZAG 10y ago
  2 screens of 4k is not 8k though.
  - ekianjo 10y ago
    Yeah, it's not, but that's close enough - if you have a 8K capable GPU, then you should be able to run 4K on two eyes at very high frame rates.
- OGloMe 10y ago
  we actually will need less gpu power for vr than for monitor gaming. foveated rendering will do the trick
  - russdill 10y ago
    Will be an exciting time once super high pixel count displays and eye tracking combine. What a time to be alive.
- shpx 10y ago
  60 pixels per degree, 210° by 100° for full 20/20 vision (most people have slightly better)[0]. Headsets right now are ~12 pixels per degree. Thats a 12600x6000 screen = 76megapixels. 4k is 8.3 megapixels, 8k is 33.2 megapixels. 8k/eye sounds about right. [0] https://youtu.be/Qwh1LBzz3AU?t=23m39s https://youtu.be/Qwh1LBzz3AU?t=23m39s
- snovv_crash 10y ago
  If we do eye tracking we can probably lower that to 1024x786 equivalent rendering, by using high resolution where the eye is looking and tapering off to just a blurry mess further away. You can even completely leave out the pixels at the optic nerve blind spot. The person with the headset won't be able to tell they aren't getting full 4k or even higher resolution. And we can run better effects, more anti-aliasing, maybe even raytracing in real-time.
  - angry_octet 10y ago
    If this is the nvidia/smi research you are referring too, well it seems nice but without details, specifically dynamic performance, and there is reason to be sceptical of how good it is. The field of view of current consumer HMDs is too narrow for there to be a big saving compared to the downside. As you move to larger FOV displays the brain will start doing more saccades (rapid step changes in viewpoint[1]) and the response time of the image generator and eye tracker is too slow to generate more pixels at the right spot. It's much more effective to just render the whole thing at the maximum possible resolution. There has been promising research on rendering at a reduced update rate or reduced geometry in low interest areas of the scene[2]. Also, eye tracking is a massive pain in the ass. [1]https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/books/NBK10991/ https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/books/NBK10991/ [2]https://kth.diva-portal.org/smash/get/diva2:947325/FULLTEXT01.pdf https://kth.diva-portal.org/smash/get/diva2:947325/FULLTEXT0...

Orangeair 10y ago

Quite far away. Even the Titan X Pascal is having some trouble maintaining a consistent 60 fps in all games. http://www.gamersnexus.net/hwreviews/2659-nvidia-gtx-titan-x-pascal-review-and-benchmark/page-4 http://www.gamersnexus.net/hwreviews/2659-nvidia-gtx-titan-x... See the Mirror's Edge and The Division benchmarks. Averages are (just) over 60, but there are dips below. Personally, I think the best resolution for current-gen cards is 3440x1440. Should be rock solid 60+ fps in all games, and gives the benefit of being ultrawide.

yoodenvranx 10y ago
I haven't owned a gaming PC in close to 10 years and todays performance numbers look completely crazy to me. The last time I played a game I was happy that I could get 1024x768 smoothly with high framerates. Seeing that you can play 3440x1440 with 60fps feels like magic.
- Warp__ 10y ago
  It's Amazing. Battlefield 1 on Ultra/Headphones/3440x1440 at 60fps is Incredibly Immersive.
  - Foxhuls 10y ago
    Have you gotten to see the ultrawides that run at 100hz? They're pretty incredible.
    - braveo 10y ago
      Do you have a link to one of these?
      - bcrescimanno 10y ago
        There are two and they use the same panel: * ASUS PG348Q (I own this one and I love it) * Acer Predator X34 (My colleague 4 seats down has this one and she loves it).

kayoone 10y ago

this card can do 4K pretty comfortably now, at least if 60fps is the benchmark (VR needs more) but 8K is still pretty far away. Other than VR, there is hardly a use case for it though, and even in 4K VR should be a lot better than it is now.

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mtgx 10y ago

Check the framerates games get on 4k resolution, divide by 4, and then see how far away you are from at least 30fps.

godzillabrennus 10y ago

Linus Tech Tips on YouTube recently got an 8K setup going using four 4K monitors and it ran surprisingly well. https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=211Vdi4oC9o https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=211Vdi4oC9o The biggest limitation it seems is lack of displays because the gpu tech seems to be able to handle it.

replete 10y ago

8K anything is almost pointless unless you have far above average eyesight, like 20:5. 4K is the real sweet spot for typical human vision.

rocky1138 10y ago
Perhaps for a desktop or laptop, but in VR it will make a tremendous difference. 4320p will be really nice for VR.